• Australian airline Qantas reduced to “junk” status - World Socialist Web Site

    http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2014/01/10/qant-j10.html

    Australian airline Qantas reduced to “junk” status
    By Patrick O’Connor
    10 January 2014

    International credit rating agency Moody’s yesterday downgraded Australian airline Qantas to investment “junk” status, following a similar move by Standard & Poor’s last month. Moody’s announcement comes as even more job cuts at the airline are threatened, with Qantas executives preparing to release a major “strategic review” expected to involve major asset sales.

    Explaining its unusual decision to downgrade Qantas by two notches, to Baa3, junk or “non-investment grade,” Moody’s cited a “sharp deterioration in the company’s core domestic business” due to “aggressive competitive actions by Qantas’ key domestic competitor, Virgin Australia.” A spokesman for the credit agency, Ian Lewis, explained that further downgrades were possible, with a “negative outlook” assigned to the company. “The material downturn in Qantas’ domestic business also comes at a time when the carrier is grappling with a turnaround in its loss making international mainline business,” Lewis said. “As such the business is exposed to execution challenges on two fronts, simultaneously.”

    #transport_aérien #qantas #australie